Yukon UFO "Mothership" Incident: December 11th, 1996

I continue to be impressed by, and be appreciative of, the high level of comments and critical analysis shown by the posters here -- all the more
reason to regret that I don't have all the time I'd like to immediately respond in detail. But follow-up investigations are continuing, including
gathering of reports from much farther afield -- reports which do suggest the high-altitude nature of the stimulus.

Originally posted by bluestreak53
"It was like I had this overpowering sense of loss... Like that was it???!! A close encounter but not of the third kind. No missing time line, no
beaming me up, no probing, no implants, no extraterrestrial abduction, no glimpse of other worlds or of other beings, no nothing but just clear
silence. Just a memory. Like ships that pass in the night"

I think that shows a problem with some witnesses in UFO cases: they are already expecting something to happen, so they are predisposed to see
something and are not completely unbiased.

So what would be your reaction if a giant craft (size of a football stadium), seemingly of alien origin were to slowly pass above you, less than 100
meters over your head? I think I might be thinking "Whats with you? What am I? Chopped liver?"

Originally posted by bluestreak53
So what would be your reaction if a giant craft (size of a football stadium), seemingly of alien origin were to slowly pass above you, less than 100
meters over your head?

Originally posted by JimOberg
I continue to be impressed by, and be appreciative of, the high level of comments and critical analysis shown by the posters here -- all the more
reason to regret that I don't have all the time I'd like to immediately respond in detail. But follow-up investigations are continuing, including
gathering of reports from much farther afield -- reports which do suggest the high-altitude nature of the stimulus.

I see you are sticking to your theory despite the fact your version of events contradicts eyewitness testimony completely. You have asked numerous
times in this thread for people to describe what they believe doesn't line up in regards to your theory and the eyewitness reports. Yet when people
have done precisely that, you've selectively ignored portions of the investigation.

So I would like to ask you (since you are the expert):

How is it possible the witnesses saw a re-entry, when two witnesses (one who saw the other pulled over on the road ahead of him) both saw the object
pass OVER them (One witness reporting the object pass low over the other witnesses car, and the other witness reporting the object passing low
DIRECTLY OVERHEAD, and describing a large circular light on the bottom of the object, as it SCANNED THE GROUND WITH OTHER BEAMS OF LIGHT). Using
triangulation (which you've eluded to several times), doesn't this testimony completely render the re-entry explanation invalid?

I do not wish to be linked to other cases. Please simply describe for me how this particular testimony can be mistaken for re-entry. I would also
appreciate it if you'd refrain from accusing me of not knowing what a re-entry looks like, as we've all seen video footage of re-entry's, and
youtube videos have even been provided in this thread.

Originally posted by DeadSeraph
How is it possible the witnesses saw a re-entry, when two witnesses (one who saw the other pulled over on the road ahead of him) both saw the object
pass OVER them (One witness reporting the object pass low over the other witnesses car, and the other witness reporting the object passing low
DIRECTLY OVERHEAD, and describing a large circular light on the bottom of the object, as it SCANNED THE GROUND WITH OTHER BEAMS OF LIGHT). Using
triangulation (which you've eluded to several times), doesn't this testimony completely render the re-entry explanation invalid?

Originally posted by JimOberg
Mods, can we close this leftover thread and concentrate discussion here:

It gives all the links and shows, step by step, Jim Oberg and other ATS members converting a very important UFO sighting into an IFO sighting.

The other thread gives too much credit to Robert Sheaffer.

I'm a strong 'believer' in the theory that intelligent ET probes (without alien occupants) have been surveying this planet since at least the
1940s. Yet, as this thread shows, I posted the Cosmos 2335 idea on 24 April. Sheaffer didn't pick up the idea until 30 April.

So debunker Sheaffer can't even do scepticism as well as a benighted 'believer'. No wonder a Sheaffer crony like Jim wants to close down this
thread.

Originally posted by JimOberg
We still are at an impasse in that folks who don't really know what a satellite reentry looks like, insist that it couldn't have sparked the
perceptions reported by some of the witnesses.

How many examples would be sufficient to prove that yes, sometimes such apparitions CAN spark exactly these kinds of perceptions?

Seeing is believing, so I think you can probably help those in doubt, Jim. There appear to many videos of various types of re-entries out there on the
net. Can you point to any which would give people an idea of what this Yukon reentry might have looked like? Keeping in mind the specific hardware and
other conditions in play at the time of this event, obviously.

The writer of the report upon which you're relying said the following within it, and in my mind these are the parameters which would need to be
accounted for in a video demonstrating the plausibility of the reentry hypothesis:
-- The "known path of the decaying rocket [was] 200 to 400 km to the north [of the witnesses], depending on the observer's location."
--"Breakup and terminal descent probably occurred soon after the Yukon sightings, somewhat farther to the east."
--"I estimate that during this [sighting] period the object was no more than about 90 km above the geoid on average."

There's no sarcasm here, and this is certainly not a "challenge" in any negative sense of the word. I think that many reasonable people on ATS are
sincerely willing to be convinced by your explanation, but currently the above items seem to be the seeds of some serious and legitimate doubt.

Originally posted by TeaAndStrumpets
There's no sarcasm here, and this is certainly not a "challenge" in any negative sense of the word. I think that many reasonable people on ATS are
sincerely willing to be convinced by your explanation, but currently the above items seem to be the seeds of some serious and legitimate doubt.

None detected -- nor even objected to, when used.

I'm in total agreement here. The notion that intelligent, rational people can see a stream of fireballs in the sky and somehow think they are seeing
lit windows in a giant craft is mind-boggling.

I wouldn't have believed it, myself. Nobody should.

When I began to see cases where it seemed like it HAD happened, I really wanted to find out how the eye-brain system COULD create such a major
fail.

And the burden has to be on a 'skeptic' who wants people to believe it's possible for such a humongous misperception to not only happen once or
twice, but repeatedly, and as often as a 'rule', as an exception..

Thanks to discussions around here, where people very carefully and in detail laid out the reasons they could not believe it either. I decided it was
about time to dig deeper into such cases and see how much visual evidence was available. Rational and reasonable objections demand the same tone of a
response.

The biggest breakthrough on the path to this argument is the image posted earlier today. It's from a UFO wave over the Ukraine on October 30, 1963.
It coincides with the PROBABLE reentry of the Kosmos-20 booster,

But one witness created that drawing of what HE thought he saw. AND he wasn't the only one.

I'm doing some more research on this and getting some source documents posted on my home page, so it'll be another week or so before it's all ready
for consideration.

When I began to see cases where it seemed like it HAD happened, I really wanted to find out how the eye-brain system COULD create such a major
fail.

I would really like to hear more on this part....like if there was any literature you came across...a link or something. But I don't think its a
fail. I think thats what brains just do. But not just one brain, several with lots of adrenaline running through them

If we take a close look at the structure of common neurotransmitters (Fig. 1) the transmitters most closely related to the classic psychedelics
are serotonin (5-HT), adrenaline (epinephrine), norepinephrine,

I'm in total agreement here. The notion that intelligent, rational people can see a stream of fireballs in the sky and somehow think they are seeing
lit windows in a giant craft is mind-boggling.

what is mind-boggling to me is that this, err, discussion is still going.
i would agree that we have reached an 'impasse'
but i would strenuously disagree that it is about folks who don't know satellite re-entry insisting it's not.
if anything, i would say it has to do with folks who have seen the reentry videos on this thread and concluded that this explanation falls drastically
short of explaining very much of any of these sightings,
and a certain 'reasearcher' who appears to have misinterpreted this response as further proof that he and he alone has the intellect and the vision
to truly know what happened many years ago in a cold and relatively remote part of the world.
Short of dramatic new evidence, none of us are never going to know what actually happened.
Right now my concern is far less over uncovering some truth
as it is that over the course of this thread HUGE parts of the witness testimonies have been totally ignored in favour of a mundane explanation, which
has then been apparently accepted.
i'm not posting them yet again; anyone reading this thread the way it should be read will already know the deal.
i'm not saying it's aliens, it could quite easily have a very simple explanation [that currently escapes me]

what i am saying is that time and again various posters have pointed out inconsistencies but been swatted down by this magical answer to absolutely
anything; your eyes were deceiving you.
this seems to be a pretty backwards way to go about investigating a sighting.
especially one like this that is solely witness reports.
no video, no photo, don't bother with the story cus YOUR EYES WERE DECEIVING YOU.
heck, if that's going to be accepted unquestioningly now
we may as well gouge out our eyes and spend the rest of our lives in dark rooms
cus that's as close as we're going to get to the truth.

Originally posted by decepticonLaura
.....but i would strenuously disagree that it is about folks who don't know satellite re-entry insisting it's not.
if anything, i would say it has to do with folks who have seen the reentry videos on this thread and concluded that this explanation falls drastically
short of explaining very much of any of these sightings,
and a certain 'reasearcher' who appears to have misinterpreted this response as further proof that he and he alone has the intellect and the vision
to truly know what happened many years ago in a cold and relatively remote part of the world.

As I said, no objection on my part to satire.... [grin]

The problem is, that videos of satellite reentries don't convey the same visual impressions to at-home TV viewers, that seeing it yourself does --
according to the eyewitnesses themselves.

The main problem is the range of brightness, and the flight paths of parallel-moving horizintally-flying objects that appear on tape only as jumbled
streaks, when to witnesses they appear as a pattern of moving dots in precise formation. None of the key impressions a witness SEES is conveyed by the
videos.

What is SEEN is totally at variance with what Hollywood and TV documentaries reconstruct as a 'falling satellite', which is usually shown as FALLING
-- headed towards the ground at a steep angle -- in FLAMES, burning all the way to the ground, where it impacts and usually explodes.

NONE of this actually happens in a satellite reentry.

Horizontal flight -- the object is in a low orbit of Earth following a path essentially parallel to Earth's surface.
As energy is lost to air resistence, the path gets lower and lower, but still is essentially 'level flight'.

The fireball phase begins at about 60 miles up, and a glow -- soon, full-fledged flames -- engulfs the object.

Both due to heating and decelleration stresses, pieces begin to break off, and soon the entire structure can fragment, especially in the cases of
recently-launched booster stages which still have substantial amounts of residual fuel in their tanks.

Even though press reports attribute this heating to 'air friction', that's wrong physics. The heating is caused by air COMPRESSION ahead of the
speeding objects, and the squeezed air heats up -- just like air in a bike tire pump heats up when you pump it. Only much more so. Actual air speed
across the surface of a reentering object, such as the space shuttle, is subsonic, but of course much faster a few inches away.

Because they follow their flight paths due to their horizontal velocity, the separated and now flame-enshrouded pieces continue horizontally and
usually 'in formation' for several minutes. Lighter or broader-in-area pieces more susceptible to drag do fall behind.

At orbital speeds -- 18,000 mph, or 5 miles per second -- and reentry altitude -- 60 miles -- the objects can cross the entire sky in a minute or
two.

As the objects slow, and the compression effects diminish, the flames die out -- still at a high altitude. The remaining pieces, now too small to be
seen by the naked eye, rain down to the ground. Slowed by thicker air, they usually hit the ground moving 'only' at several hundred miles per hour.
Denser pieces can be a bit faster.

But they still then usually 'thunk' down, indenting dirt they hit, but not exploding or digging craters. That's only an effect of much faster --
and much higher angle, so much briefer flame phase -- natural meteorite impacts.

It was clear from many well-meaning and careful responses hereabouts, that to most folks, these facts were a complete surprise. Only a few specialists
in spaceflight operations ever really needed to learn and utilize this highly-specialized knowledge. And you're right -- few of them felt the need to
share it with people who really didn't need it.

Are any of these facts in dispute? Or are public myths and misunderstandings about spacecraft reentry, somehow preferable?

Originally posted by decepticonLaura
no video, no photo, don't bother with the story cus YOUR EYES WERE DECEIVING YOU.
heck, if that's going to be accepted unquestioningly now
we may as well gouge out our eyes and spend the rest of our lives in dark rooms
cus that's as close as we're going to get to the truth.

Your eyes don't deceive you but your brain often does.

If you DON'T believe that,
you're setting yourself up for
a lifetime of being deceived, often by
people who do it on purpose and LOVE to
target people who are SURE it can't happen to THEM.

you didn't need to go describing the whole phenomena
agaaaaain
flowery verse though you may employ
and it is clear you harbour much love for your rockets
but come on, just say it outright;
these witness statements are unreliable and must be discarded.
'cus that's really the only place you can go from here.
if we're not going to believe them about so many of the details why bother believing them at all?
discard the lot i say.
so where are we now? no photos, no radar, no debris, no reliable witness
guess that's case closed.
well done.

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